Quote Origin: Every Writer Has a Lifetime Ration of Three Exclamation Points – Quote Investigator®<br /> by Quote Investigator <br /> accessed on 2026-10-08T09:31:30

Lewis, Helen. 2026. “The Men Who Want Women to Be Quiet.” The Atlantic 336(6): 26–35. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/2026/06/conservative-masculinism-misogyny/686939/ (May 27, 2026; May 28, 2026).

https://www.reddit.com/r/typewriters/comments/1qhokip/some_typewriter_customization_ideas/

Besides, why go the AI route when there are so many already available custom and chromed machines out there? There is way more creativity in reality.

Examples:

• Smith-Corona 5 series: https://mrmrsvintagetypewriters.com/en-us/products/chrome-plated-smith-corona-typewriter-part-of-david-rain-collection-tom-arden
• Richard Polt has photos of his Silver Surfer Hermes 3000, a paint stripped typewriter on page 291 of his book The Typewriter Revolution. Photo here: https://www.facebook.com/TypewriterRevolution/photos/a.1563333157165476/2155401697958616/?type=3
• Polt also talks about the process on one of his Smith-Coronas at https://writingball.blogspot.com/2011/08/sterling-silver-surfer.html
• A sterling silver Smith-Corona Sterling: https://oztypewriter.blogspot.com/2011/09/on-this-day-in-typewriter-history-civ.html
• Multiples here: https://www.reddit.com/r/typewriters/comments/1oouq6o/chrome_typewriters/
• A chromed Olympia SG1: https://www.facebook.com/groups/olympiasg1/posts/1549224696395939/
• A chrome/nickel finished Henry Dreyfuss: https://typewriterdatabase.com/1948-royal-quiet-de-luxe.25508.typewriter
• If you're really crazy, maybe a Candy Apple Green Metal Flake pin striped Hermes? https://typewriterdatabase.com/1956-hermes-2000.17456.typewriter
• A brown pin striped QDL: https://typewriterdatabase.com/1941-royal-quiet-de-luxe.19473.typewriter
• Maybe in custom "white cracked ice" https://typewriterdatabase.com/1946-royal-quiet-de-luxe.19914.typewriter
• A green hot rod? https://typewriterdatabase.com/1961-olympia-sm4.19353.typewriter

And to be honest, if you're going to lay out some money to chrome a machine, why do it with a flimsy Skyriter? Find something showy, something honest, something substantial. Why not a Royal KMG or FP, a Remington Super-Riter, or a solid Hermes Ambassador?

Nothing is more badass than Helen Gurley Brown's silver plated Royal Empress: https://site.xavier.edu/polt/typewriters/hgbrownroyal.jpg

reply to u/highspeed_steel at https://reddit.com/r/typewriters/comments/1krspvh/im_totally_blind_and_new_to_typewriters_wax/

Your question is a great one, but I'll go another direction since I'd dug into some of the history and details of Helen Keller's mid-century typewriters a while back. You can find some details and descriptions here (and in the associated links which includes an accessible video of Ms. Keller using a solid and sexy black Remington Noiseless standard typewriter): https://www.reddit.com/r/typewriters/comments/1ihot96/helen_kellers_typewriters/

She managed on both her Remington as well as her brailler as well as any sighted person, though obviously had someone to check her printed work.

I recently saw another heavily modified midcentury typewriter for someone who, if I recall correctly was not only blind, but had no arms. It was set up so that they could move a selector and type using a custom chin rest. Sadly, I didn't index it at the time, but it's interesting to know that such things existed for accessibility reasons.

As for Braillers, you might appreciate this recent article about a repairman in Britain who was retiring: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/jan/02/wed-be-stuck-alarm-as-uks-last-braille-typewriter-repairer-ponders-retirement

I've got my own brailler, which is a sleek-looking art-deco industrial piece of art with the loveliest shade of dark shiny gray paint I've ever seen on a typewriter. (I'm both a mathematician and information theorist into the areas of coding and cryptography, so Morse code, Braille, etc. are professionally fascinating to me.) I still need to take it apart and repair a few portions to get it back to perfection, but it generally works well.

As for the aesthetics, I personally enjoy the solid industrial look and feel of the machines from the 1930s-1960s. The early 30s and some 40s have glossy black enamel and machines like the Corona Standard/Silent from the 30s are low slung with flat tops that sort of resemble small pianos and just scream out "I'm a writer" with a flair for dark academia and just a hint of classical Roman design. Many of these machines come with gold tinged water-slide decals which really set themselves off against the black enamel, though on the majority of machines the gold is beginning to dim from time, wear, and uncareful application of cleaning solutions.

I love the Royal KMM, KMG, and the Remington 17, Standard, and Super-Riter for their industrial chonkiness and (usually) their glass keytops. One of my favorites is the Henry Dreyfuss designed Royal Quiet De Luxe from 1948 which always gives me the feel of what it would look like if a typewriter wore a tuxedo or the 1948 gray and chrome model which is similar but has the feel of a sleek gray flannel suit on a 1950s advertising executive prone to wearing dapper hats, smoking cigarettes, and always with a cocktail in his hand. Into the 50s and 60s almost everyone had moved to plastic keytops which I don't think are as pretty as the older glass keytops with the polished metal rings around them.

At the opposite end of that spectrum are the late 50s Royal FP and Futura 800s which have some colorful roundness which evokes the aesthetic of the coming space age. They remind me of the modern curves and star shapes of the television show The Jetsons. Similarly space-aged are the sexy curves of the silver metalic spray paint on wooden cases for the Olympia SM3 from the same period. These to me are quintessential typewriter industrial design. In gray, green, maroon, brown, and sometimes yellow crinkle paint with just a hint of sparkle in their keytops I really love the combination of roundedness and slight angularity these German designed machines provide. They have a definite understated sort of elegance most other typewriters just miss. I suspect that late-in-life Steve Jobs would have had an Olympia SM3.

There's something comforting about the 40s and 50s sports-car vibe of the smaller Smith-Corona portables of the 5 series machines in the 1950s with their racing stripes on the hood. They feel like the sort of typewriter James Dean would have used as a student—just hip enough to be cool while still be solid and functional.

Sadly into the 70s, while machines typically got a broader range of colors outside of the typical black, gray, and browns things became more plastic and angular. They also begin to loose some of the industrial mid-century aesthetic that earlier machines had. They often feel very 70s in an uncomplimentary way without the fun color combinations or whimsy that art and general design of of that period may have had in the music or fashion spaces. They make me think of politics and war rather than the burgeoning sexual revolution of the time period.

Interestingly, for me, I feel like most typewriter design was often 10-20 years behind the general design aesthetic/zeitgeist for the particular decades in which they were made.

Good luck in your search for the right typewriter(s) for your own collection.

Film clip of Helen Keller at her home in Westport, CT. She is seen pulling a book from her library s... 1953 by [[Helen Keller Archive]]

reply to u/HenRoRo61

Earlier today, in a now-deleted post, someone had posted a question about identifying one of Helen Keller's typewriters based on this video in her archive.

Having done some initial digging, I thought I'd share some of the details I've found for those who may find it interesting.

According to researcher Richard Polt, Helen Keller was known to use both a Hammond and an L.C. Smith no. 5.

As for the Remington Noiseless, it definitely appears to be a mid-century Noiseless Standard with a tabulator. To know the year, you'd need either the specific serial number (to cross check https://typewriterdatabase.com/remington.42.typewriter-serial-number-database) or you'd need many more examples than the Typewriter Database currently has listed under the generic Remington Noiseless.

If you're careful at looking at the design choices and changes in some of the Remington Portables from that time period which would have likely tracked the design changes of their desktop standards, you might be able to extrapolate a closer dating based on the styling, but this will still only give you a dating within a year or so.

The tabulator was at the top of the keyboard by 1937, so you can probably presume it was a model from that point or thereafter until 1954. Most American typewriter manufacturers didn't make machines from '41-45 due to WWII, so you can discard those dates. Remington had moved into thicker/taller plastic keys by the early 1950s, so I would guess her machine was more likely from the late 1940s.

Looking more closely at the Remington Noiseless 10, I'd suggest that this is the most likely set of candidates, particularly in the timeframe of 1946-1947. Hers obviously had the openings in the rear and had the metal covers on the sides (as opposed to glass found on some models). Comparing hers in the film to some of these individual galleries may help to narrow things down with respect to dating.

Perhaps others with more Remington Standard experience, may be able to narrow things down here.

The appraisal of her Remington Noiseless in 1957 was $135.00.

One might find some close noiseless models in the $20-40 range + shipping (these are about 30 pounds and will cost about $35 for shipping) via ShopGoodwill.com. Here are some recent sales for comparison. Based on the video you'll want the bigger, heavier ones (25+ pounds) rather than the smaller portables with cases (usually under 20 pounds). Generally machines purchased this way are reasonably functional, but usually need some cleaning and work to be restored to full functionality.

Unless you're sure they're being sold by repair shops and have been cleaned and are fully functional, don't overspend on potential exemplars on sites like Etsy or eBay which are likely to be only marginally better (aka dusted off) than ShopGoodwill machines, but at 5-10x the price.

Hellen Keller's brailler: https://www.afb.org/HelenKellerArchive?a=d&d=A-HK08-B049-183&e=-------en-20--1--txt--typewriter------3-7-6-5-3--------------0-1

She apparently owned a \~1938 or 1939 Corona Silent as well: https://www.afb.org/HelenKellerArchive?a=d&d=A-HK08-B045-184.1.1&srpos=19&e=-------en-20--1--txt--typewriter------3-7-6-5-3--------------0-1

One might have some luck trying to find a Corona Silent typewriter from that era, but the unique color is going to put a machine like it into the $100-200 range (at a minimum and potentially going up from there depending on the condition) unless you get lucky at a garage sale somewhere.

Sword, Helen. Air & Light & Time & Space: How Successful Academics Write. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2017. https://amzn.to/4iYPhCE.

Scholars Talk Writing: Helen Sword by [[Rachel Toor]] in Chronicle of Higher Education, 2017-07-31 archived version: https://web.archive.org/web/20210722062708/https://www.chronicle.com/article/scholars-talk-writing-helen-sword/

Abduction of Helen—wife of Menelaus—by Paris, as cause of Trojan war.

https://helenbeetham.substack.com/

Helen Beetham's work and newsletter are recommended by Doug Belshaw. If I heard correctly, she'll shortly appear on Season 8 of the Tao of Wao podcast: https://soundcloud.com/tao-of-wao/sets/season-8

Durch seine LNG-Importe im vergangenen Jahr hat Europa die Preise so nach oben getrieben, dass Pakistan und wohl auch China stattdessen Kohle verwendet haben. Standard-Interview mit Helen Thompson die sich mit den politischen Auswirkungen von Gas beschäftigt. https://www.derstandard.at/story/2000146167458/cambridge-professorin-thompson-europa-hat-sein-gasproblem-ausgelagert.

Another Door, Helen

She didn't only help the blind and disabled she also went to base camps in ww11 and showed the wounded solders what she can do with a distantly and what they can too.

Helen Keller was associates with important such as Alexander Graham bell and President Roosevelt.

Not was Helen Keller the face for the AFB but she was also a national leader for the socialist party. This info shows that she was a big part of the 20th century not only for disabled but for everyone else as well.

Just because people have disables doesn't mean that they have to be discriminated on, Helen Keller started a revolution for improving the life for people that are deaf or blind.

Helen Keller's achievements in creating many foundations were celebrated around the world to recognize the achievements of many blind and deaf people.

There was a fire lit underneath her when she found out that she could learn to speak and she went ahead and learned French German and english.

1.3. Alexander (Paris), son of Priam, king of Troy, abducts Helen, wife of Menelaus, from Sparta. Other authors were less certain about Helen's lack of complicity.